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Thursday, November 15, 2007

Islamic 'justice' ... ctd

Two little news items, one reported by the BBC today, the other briefly summarised from the DER SPIEGEL website ... they speaks more or less for themselves, I think, so I shall merely reproduce them here. Before someone gets on the soapbox 'explaining' that Islam is a peaceful ideology, deeply tolerant, and so on and so forth, perhaps it's worth pointing out that it is kind of odd that this sort of stuff only seems to happen in countries that call themselves Islamic. Kinda think that the proof's in the pudding, and that pudding just doesn't seem to suggest tolerant and peaceful ideology to me...

An appeal court in Saudi Arabia has doubled the number of lashes and added a jail sentence as punishment for a woman who was gang-raped.

The victim was initially punished for violating laws on segregation of the sexes - she was in an unrelated man's car at the time of the attack.

When she appealed, the judges said she had been attempting to use the media to influence them.

The attackers' sentences - originally of up to five years - were doubled.

Extra penalties

According to the Arab News newspaper, the 19-year-old woman, who is from Saudi Arabia's Shia minority, was gang-raped 14 times in an attack in the eastern province a year-and-a-half ago.

Seven men from the majority Sunni community were found guilty of the rape and sentenced to prison terms ranging from just under a year to five years.

But the victim was also punished for violating Saudi Arabia's laws on segregation that forbid unrelated men and women from associating with each other. She was initially sentenced to 90 lashes for being in the car of a strange man.

On appeal, the Arab News reported that the punishment was not reduced but increased to 200 lashes and a six-month prison sentence.

The rapists also had their prison terms doubled. But the sentences are still low considering they could have faced the death penalty.

The Arab News quoted an official as saying the judges had decided to punish the girl for trying to aggravate and influence the judiciary through the media.

The victim's lawyer was suspended from the case, has had his license to work confiscated, and faces a disciplinary session.

The DER SPIEGEL weekly news magazine reports today that in the peace loving Islamic nation of Afghanistan a teenage boy was shot to death by peace loving Islamic freedom fighters ... because he taught a neighboring kids English after class. Thank goodness for that peace loving, tolerant etc etc